


Not Worthy

by Quingy



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, POV Blackwall, Plothole Fill, Regret, Trespasser DLC, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2016-07-22
Packaged: 2018-07-26 02:18:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7556302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quingy/pseuds/Quingy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two years after their break-up, Thom Rainier encounters Evie Trevelyan at the Exalted Council. He reflects on their relationship and confronts the fact that she is now with Cullen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Worthy

Two years. That’s how long it had been since he’d last seen her, and damn if he hadn’t felt every day of that time. She rode into the Orlesian capital on a shining white horse, alongside Cullen. Together on their steeds you might have mistaken them for royalty. Cullen… he was a man worthy of her.

_Worthy the way I never could be_.

They deserved to be happy together.

Thom Rainier’s hands clenched into fists at his side as he watched the Herald of Andraste and her entourage ride into the city.

 

She was happier to see him than he’d expected. He’d prepared himself for her scorn, perhaps even to be ignored by her. Instead she warmly greeted him, and her smile tore him up inside. Two years of dreaming of that smile, to see it again…

They had a conversation about his work with the Wardens, and then she left to visit with others. Thom couldn’t help but want to stay within earshot, to hear her laughing and having fun with their old friends. He kept a respectful distance, but when she found Cullen, he could do nothing but helplessly watch. Watch as she smiled—truly smiled, with joy and love—she smiled at Cullen with more affection and trust than she’d ever felt for him.

_I will always love you, but I can never trust you again. I’m sorry._ Sometimes Thom imagined those were the last words she said to him. Somehow everything said between them after felt meaningless.

Thom turned away when Cullen and Evie began to kiss.

 

The next time they saw each other, Thom couldn’t help but ask. He was driven by a destructive curiosity, a masochistic need to know if there was anything he could have done differently—other than never lie to her—that would have ended with her looking at him the way she did at Cullen.

“Did you really love me? Like you love Cullen.”

She blinked at the question, her eyebrows drawing together the way they did when she was deep in thought. He noticed she had changed her hair once more. She’d been a blonde and then a redhead when they’d been together, now her hair was dark blue and much shorter. It suited her; brought out the blue in her sea-green eyes. But he had treasured memories of time spent with her when her hair was longer, running his fingers through it, watching the wind blow it behind her like a cape. It was just one more way she had changed since he’d known her.

“No,” she answered him while he was still distracted by her hair, and it took a minute for what she was saying to sink in. “I…” she sighed. “This is terrible. I never thought I’d be explaining this… not to you.”

“What is there to explain? I’d think it would be simple,” he said, more abrasively than he’d meant to. Her jaw tightened, and he knew he’d pushed her enough to tell him.

“It’s not simple. Or, it didn’t feel very simple at the time.” She ran a hand through her short blue hair, brushing her bangs off of her forehead. “I had—still have—great affection for you, and at one time, I desired you. But I couldn’t love you. Not when you so obviously hated yourself for being with me. I know now why, but at the time I remember thinking you were worried you’d die on me. I thought maybe your Calling was near, and that would be the end of us. The morning you left… that was what I thought before one of Leliana’s agents found me.”

She looked down at the ground and her voice became very soft, “I don’t know if it could have been different. Maybe if you’d told me who you were from the start, we’d have been able to build something real. But the truth is, I fell in love with Cullen while you and I were still together. I would have ended things with you eventually; I just didn’t know how. I didn’t want to hurt you, and then you hurt me first.”

She left him standing speechless, tears sparkled in her eyes as she turned away from him. He wondered how many tears she’d shed over him. He wasn’t worth any of them. Wasn’t worth her sadness. Her love. Her trust.

He never had been. She’d just been too kind to tell him.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't realize once you start dating Blackwall, you're stuck with him until the 'Revelations' reveal. This was born of that mistake.


End file.
